Why would you install the highest power CCS station in the world in the public at your most popular charging location? That's only going to frustrate and confuse end users.

Thicker cables shouldn't be necessary, but higher voltage charging will be. 1000V at a minimum, but 1500V would make cabling easier. Difficulties now become safety of higher voltage systems.

No, Harvey, because they would still significantly increase frontal area of the vehicle. Aerodynamic crossbars would be better. Roof racks that are easy to remove and install would also encourage people to remove them when not used.

One detail the summary misses - apparently there will only be room for two in the back making this a 4-seater. Not even a 1/2 seat for someone small to squeeze into like the the '16+ Volt. That's going to rule this vehicle out for a lot of people, unfortunately. There's a lot of 2-child families out there who occasionally need to squeeze a 3rd child back there.

I think this is the first substantial order of electric buses in the USA. Hopefully more come quickly!

No plug?

HarveyD, you just need the right winter Tire and then you can have the best of both worlds - excellent snow traction and low rolling resistance. Check out the Nokian Hakkapeliitta R2, for example. There really ought to be a standardized test run on tires to rate rolling resistance, and it should be mandatory.

"If you need more room, don't have a plug at home, do LOTS more highway driving get a Malibu Hybrid. Otherwise, a Volt maybe for you. YMMV." But I need more room, have a plug at home and don't often drive more than 50 miles round trip away from home, but when I do, I often drive a LOT farther, so getting better efficiency when the engine is running is important.

Two questions: 1. Why doesn't the Volt, a smaller car get similar fuel economy in gas mode? 2. Why doesn't GM offer the Malibu with the Volt drivetrain? The larger size of the Malibu is much more appealing for those who often need to use the rear seats.

Wow - it only gets worse for VW. These are the same family of engines which VW initially contested the EPA statement. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-11-02/vw-prepares-to-fight-epa-s-latest-diesel-cheating-allegations

Filipe, VW TDIs both with and without SCR were found to vastly exceed USA regulated NOx emissions levels on the road while on the dyno they failed.

@Herman - LOL! I think the main takeaway is that we need to accelerate decarbonization of the grid. With solar and storage pricing continuing to drop, it could start to happen very quickly. Just look at the recent news of solar costs in Austin, TX - less than 4c/kWh.

Unfortunately, it appears that Android users are not able to Pay with PlugShare yet...

Unfortunately, it appears that Android users are not able to Pay with PlugShare yet...

You guys are still missing the point of the study. I don't think anyone is saying that MOAR RANGE!!!! wouldn't help. But look at the charts. Now imagine that 50% remaining usable capacity is really you have left in winter conditions. Now look at how many more miles you can make in two bands: 1. Workplace charging (L1 vs L2 not a huge difference). 2. Ubiquitous L1 charging. In short, the range you have (whether due to capacity loss or weather conditions), the more charging infrastructure you have, the more you can drive your EV. Another way to look at is that with just L1 charging everywhere, with 50% of the range you can drive almost as many miles as you can with a 95-100% battery and charging at home. From personal experience I can tell you that I've had many scenarios where if I had even L1 workplace charging it would have enabled quite a few more trips without worry.

Davemart, you're missing the point. The point being that having simple 120V plugs available everywhere one parks significantly improves usable range of today's EVs today and tomorrow. I'd love to add addition scenarios adding 5, 10, 20 and 30 minute Quick Charge stops, too. I imagine that the biggest bang for the buck comes from the first 5-10 minutes of QC when charge rates are the highest.

How does it compare to the regular EP422 which has been out for years? I can confirm that at least the OEM EP422 that comes on the LEAF is much better than the supposedly LRR tires I replaced them with.

"I would like to see more research with numbers attached to show how the efficiency of second life batteries declines in line with capacity reduction or aging." Arnold, the efficiency of the batteries does not change any significant amount at all, unless you are using excessive high rates of charge or discharge which cause the pack to heat up excessively. The internal resistance of a battery does go up as it ages, so there will be some reduction in efficiency, but at typical grid service loads of 0.5C to 1C, it should be just about negligible.

CCG's track record in maintaining existing infrastructure is poor at best. It can take months to repair charging stations after being reported. An unreliable charging station is not much better than not having one at all.

It was an exciting race. I'm looking forward to seeing how the cars evolve over the years as battery technology improves and allows for more power and higher speeds. I was a bit skeptical of how the car change would work out, but the way they did it worked out well. Those curbs are dangerous! Nick Heidfeld luckily walked away from the crash without incident, but it's easy to see how it could have been worse with the curb launching his car into the air on the final corner.

@Anthony - Today's < 100 mi EVs that can QC, can pick up 25 miles of range when QCd from a low state of charge on a 40-50kW QC station in 10 minutes. So with sufficient QC infrastructure situated so that one knows that they can rely on charging if they get low, current EVs are OK. With even a bit more battery, EVs will be able to even better take advantage of 40-50kW QC stations. @Nick - availability of street charging especially in residential areas is definitely an issue for wide-spread adoption. Ultimately more workplace charging and larger battery packs will be required for wider adoption once it gets to that point. For a lot of reasons, it's pretty reasonable to expect a mix of hybrids, PHEVs and EVs for the forseeable future. It will take 200+ mile affordable EVs along with 100 kW+ charging infrastructure, to really see widespread EV adoption.

I'm no hydrogen FC fan, but to be fair, a single $1.66M hydrogen station can probably service a lot more cars than the charging stations being installed. A single hydrogen station is probably equivalent (in terms of cars per day) to a dozen DC quick chargers. A single DC QC station costs about $60k to install ( see RMI article: http://goo.gl/4Spjbh ) That said, $1.66M would buy at least 30 QC stations - probably significantly more if you leverage economies of scale by installing multiple QC stations per location. $1.66M would buy you at least 300 L2 stations. $50M would let you install at least 1,000 QC or 10,000 L2 stations. Installed at the right locations, you could cover the entire state in one fell swoop. Pretty easy to see that charging stations make a lot more sense at this point to install given the number of plug-ins on the road today and the number of plug-ins available to purchase. Really the only big hurdle now for plug-ins is the lack of an affordable 125mi+ EV with quick charging (about 50% more range than today's EVs. Once that becomes available (and all signs point to that happening within the next two years), it's game-over.

I really wish that manufacturers were required to publish rolling resistance numbers in the USA so that one could compare different tires like they do in Europe. It would make choosing tires a lot easier.

This is really going to appeal to all those plug-in hybrid owners who can only charge at 16A max anyway. Personally, I'd still pay a bit more for the 30A capable unit to future proof the install for future plug-ins.

While Nissan has earlier said that the hot-weather pack would be released late spring this year, so far there has been no confirmation that they have yet started shipping those batteries.